Holidays

Sorrento 2011

On Friday, 16 September, 45of us left St Teresa's by coach and plane for a seven day holiday in Sorrento, Italy.

Our hotel, the 4* Conca Park, was ideally situated being only a short distance from the centre of Sorrento.Guest rooms were very clean and the restaurant and public areas in the hotel very well appointed. The hotel staff were friendly and helpful and did their best to make our stay enjoyable.

Sitting on the top of cliffs situated within the Bay of Naples, The town of Sorrento is beautiful.. As a shopping experience, everything you could wish for is clustered into its narrow streets and spacious squares. Leather goods, silks, ceramics, and lemons (including Limoncello, an alcoholic lemon drink) are specialities of the region.

We spent several days sat in one of the many cafe`s and bars having a drink and watching the world go by - Italian style. Daytime traffic in Sorrento was an amazing experience - chaos without accidents!

There were many places to visit from Sorrento including the beautiful Islands of Capri and Ischia, the town of Positano, the Amalfi Coast, and the ancient roman cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii.

A number of us did everything independently wherever possible and used the local train that ran from Sorrento to Pompeii and Herculaneum.

In my opinion, the smaller city of Herculaneum was more interesting than the much larger Pompeii, many of the buildings being intact with beautiful mosaic floors and wall paintings.

Capri is a beautiful island, with plenty of small streets and luxury boutiques in the town. Once on the Island we took the funicular from the marina up to Capri Town and just walked around admiring the many very expensive designer shops.We also visited Ana Capri which was a short bus ride up the mountain from Capri Town.

Reports on visits to Positano and Ischia from other U3A members were very positive and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

After dinner in the hotel, we spent most evenings going into the town and enjoying a glass of wine or a beer and people watching.

Our thanks go to Val Street for kindly organizing a trip one evening to the Sorrento Musical Show. The show was very entertaining and although performed entirely in Italian we were swept along by the music and chorus.

Sadly the time came when we had to say our goodbyes to Sorrento. The weather for our stay was beautiful, hot and sunny with only a brief spell of rain one morning.